You Can’t Actually Buy A Frappucino With Bitcoin, But You Can Ship More Things On Blockchain

Coming every Sunday, the Hodler’s Digest will help you to track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions, and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link.

Top Stories This Week

US Security And Exchange Commission Postpones Bitcoin ETF Until Fall

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has delayed its decision on the listing and trading of a Bitcoin exchange traded fund (ETF) until September 30. The SEC is in the process of considering a rule change that would allow the fund, which is powered by investment firm VanEck and financial services company SolidX, to be listed on the CBOE BZX Equities Exchange.

According to this week’s article by the Wall Street Journal, cryptocurrency price manipulation is mainly conducted by organized “trading groups” that create “pump and dump” schemes on services like Telegram. According to the article, these groups can either create millions of dollars for themselves or be stung by the losses once all of the group dump a certain asset at the same time.

US DEA Agent: Ratio Of Criminal Activity To Legitimate BTC Transactions Has Flipped

U.S. Drug Enforcement Enforcement Administration agent Lilita Infante, who is a member of the Cyber Investigative Task Force, said this week that the number of illegitimate Bitcoin transactions has dropped to just ten percent of transactions. Infante added that she wanted people to keep using the blockchain, as it made them more easily identifiable.

U.S. coffee chain Starbucks will not be accepting Bitcoin as payment for Frappuccinos or other drinks after a week of misleading article titles implied the opposite. After last week’s announcement by the operator of the NYSE that they would be creating a new digital asset ecosystem with Starbucks as a partnered, a wave of news reports falsely represented that Starbucks would accept crypto for coffee, while really customers will rather be able to convert BTC into fiat which can then be used at Starbucks.

Jamie Dimon Breaks Crypto Silence, Calls Bitcoin A “Scam”

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said this week that Bitcoin is a “scam” and that he has “no interest” in it, while speaking at the Aspen Institute’s 25th Annual Summer Celebration Gala. According to Bloomberg, Dimon further “suggested governments may move to shut down the currencies [cryptocurrency], because of an inability to control them.” Dimon had told reporters last October that he wasn’t going to talk about Bitcoin anymore after a series of negative crypto comments in the fall.

Most Memorable Quotations

“The potential for an [exchange-traded fund] is causing investors to decide that Bitcoin is the best house in a tough market,” — Tom Lee, Fundstrat’s head of research

“The main thing to remember is that Bitcoin is very early-stage venture, but has real-time price feed — and that’s a unique thing. People get excited about the price and overreact,” — Dan Morehead, CEO of Pantera Capital

Laws And Taxes

Judge Advances Securities Class Action Case Against Tezos Creators

A U.S. District Judge has refused to dismiss a suit against the husband and wife duo behind blockchain project Tezos, who are currently accused of violating U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulations through the sale of unregistered securities in the U.S. Although the Tezos creators maintain their fundraiser took place in Switzerland, outside of U.S. jurisdicion, the judge has disagreed.

Adoption

Commonwealth Bank of Australia To Issue Bond On Blockchain Per World Bank Mandate

The largest bank in Australia, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), has been mandated by the World Bank to arrange a bond issue entirely on a blockchain. The Blockchain Offered New Debt Instrument (bond-i) will be issued and distributed on a blockchain platform under the operation of the World Bank in Washington and CBA in Sydney. For now, the two organizations are using a private Ethereum blockchain, but the CBA noted it was open to alternatives.

Study Shows ICO Market Has More Than Doubled Since Last Year

A study conducted by independent rating agency ICORating has found that the Initial Coin Offering market has more than doubled in a year. According to the agency’s report, ICOs in 2018 have already raised over $11 billion in investments, a figure which it purports is ten times larger than the sum of investments from ICOs in Q1-2 2017.

Goldman Sachs Reportedly Plans to Offer Custody For Crypto Funds

Sources told Bloomberg this week that Goldman Sachs is planning to offer its clients custody for cryptocurrency funds, as the bank says that it remains “undecided” on its cryptocurrency plans. A spokesperson for the bank said that they are exploring “various…